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Genesis 1:26 and 3:22 refer to God in the plural. In his thought-provoking review of A ‘Final Theory’ of God, Professor Vaughan Pratt, Professor Emeritus at Stanford University, argues the case for 9 gods, although not specifically in relation to Genesis. Here is a copy of his review from Amazon.com:
“Top Customer Reviews
“5.0 out of 5 stars McMillan is quite right, modulo details
“By Vaughan Pratt on June 12, 2015
“Format: Paperback
“I read Mr McMillan's book with great interest. Having studied physics at the university level myself--in fact I obtained an honours degree in physics long ago and far away--I found his arguments based on physics for the existence of a god quite compelling.
However there is more than one particle in physics, and what I didn't find was any evidence for McMillan's unspoken assumption that there was only one god, which he seemed simply to take for granted with no discussion whatsoever!
“It is surely very reasonable that the number of gods should be a perfect square, namely one of 0, 1, 4, 9, 16, etc. This would constitute a much more stable foundation for the cosmos than some random number such as 11 or 19 gods. Atheists like Richard Dawkins and monotheists like Joseph McMillan should be equally comfortable with this premise.
“But on the equally reasonable premise, if not more so, that God passes judgment on us all, the problem with an even number of gods is that this gives no way to resolve a tie. Atheists favor 0, which would appear to be the least number of gods that can avoid a question on the ground of a tie. However larger even squares such as 4, 16, 36, etc. have the same problem, leaving 1, 9, 25, etc. as the only available options for breaking ties.
“I submit this line of reasoning as further support for Mr McMillan's thesis that god exists, while further extending his thesis to rule out the possibility of an even number of gods.
“But now a problem rears its ugly head: the problem of management by large committees. A divine committee with 25 or 49 gods is surely an unmanageable number. Not even the Greeks envisaged 25 gods able to focus on serious decision making: Bacchus in particular would be insulted to be left out of any committee that large.
“This narrows the options down to 1 or 9.
“Now picture a Supreme Court of the US in which Justice Roberts was the sole member. This would have the great advantage that any question brought before the court could be settled in the time it took Justice Roberts to make up his mind on the matter. However it would leave those citizens who were on the wrong side of his philosophy of justice with the worry that they were getting the short end of the gavel.
“For citizens of any universe subject to divine intervention, the advantages of nine gods are (a) no ties, (b) a manageably small governance, and (c) fewer worries about undue bias from on high.
Taken in combination with every argument in Mr McMillan's admirable book, which nowhere rules out the possibility of more than one god, it is hard to see how our own universe in general, and physics in particular, could expect supreme justice from any number of gods other than nine.”
Link to Professor Pratt’s Amazon review: https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R3SCBL4CH3XF4E/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN;=1502507196